cuse to the minister was accepted, but Ellen wondered he could be going to.. town in the evening, but she hoped he would return in the morning; and the minister expressed a wish he would sleep at the baillie Ilan Dou's that night, if he staid all night in Rothsay.

The good minister secretly wondered how Levingstone was putting off his journey for another day; but the conduct of Levingstone silenced inquisitiveness; and Mr. Thornhill knew too well the feelings of a generous friend, to ask any further questions.

Far as the breeze can bear the billow's foam,
Survey our empire and behold our home!
Ours the wild life in tumult still to range
From toil to rest, and joy in every change.

BYRON.

AT the appointed hour Levingstone was at the rendezvous, and was soon met by one of the smugglers, who strictly enquired if he were alone, and whether the captain's wishes had been complied with. Levingstone assured him he had not told the captain's plan to any one, and they might depend on it that there was nobody with him. The smuggler immediately took from his waistcoat pocket a boatswain's call, and piped very softly, but loud enough to make echo tell who were invited to this spot.

་

In a short time Levingstone found himself in the midst of eighteen men,

each of which had a powder-horn slung to his neck, and two brace of pistols stuck along with a dirk into his belt.

The captain of the smugglers took Levingstone by the hand, and taking off his hat, raised his eyes to the starry heavens, and prayed an imprecation on himself, his followers, and their mothers, and wives, and children, if one of his crew did aught that was bad to Levingstone; every man of the crew followed the captain's example, though none of them offered to pledge Levingstone by taking him by the hand.

They marched off from the Bishop's hill down the side of a stream, crossed again in an oblique direction the town to the castle, and arrived at what once formed the sole entrance to its sable towers; and when

"The embattled portal arch they passed,
Whose ponderous gate and massy bar
Had oft rolled back the tide of war,"

two sentinels were placed with strict orders to shoot Lerwick, if he came that way, and did not instantly surrender.

The castle which Levingstone had that night entered with these generous, disinterested men, though black enough in character when viewed as smugglers, was very old indeed. It was supposed to have been built before the days of the Bruce, for in his days there was a tower in it, called in the Gaelic tongue The Prince's Tower.

It had evidently in very remote times been a place of great strength; its walls were of immense thickness, and filled up solidly in some places; in other places they were divided internally into long galleries, and at about four feet and a half from the pavement, long and regular rows of loop-holes were cut out of the stone, for the purpose of discharging arrows.

In fact, in the sides where these gal

leries were laid out, the wall could not measure less than fifteen feet in thickness; but the ruin of time and the mischief of man had made many communications from one gallery to another, independently of the stairs that anciently led the warriors from the ground gallery to that sixty feet above.

The whole building was not in the site of a square or rectangular figure, but compounded of right and curvilinear faces that face which looked to the land was semicircular; that which looked to the sea was right-lined; but there was also on each angle of the right face, a flank which was also rightlined. The sea in ancient times had rolled her proud billows very near the foundation of the grand right front; but by those changes, which are perpetually taking place, in the gaining and losing of land, by the capriciousness of this unconquered element, it would re